Custom deployment
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Hi.. I need to write a deployment program to first uninstall an old version of the application and then deploy the new version. I would also want to add the functionality for the application to check for any updates of the application that will be hosted on me web site. The application has been developed with VB 6 (SP6). Is there any one that can help me with the problem?
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Hi.. I need to write a deployment program to first uninstall an old version of the application and then deploy the new version. I would also want to add the functionality for the application to check for any updates of the application that will be hosted on me web site. The application has been developed with VB 6 (SP6). Is there any one that can help me with the problem?
You could use the Deployment wizard that comes with VB6. If you also wish, you could develop a custom Installer class in VB.net that can perform your custom step, but i'm not sure of the hybrid. You could get WISE/Installshield as well.
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You could use the Deployment wizard that comes with VB6. If you also wish, you could develop a custom Installer class in VB.net that can perform your custom step, but i'm not sure of the hybrid. You could get WISE/Installshield as well.
Thanks Paul. The other problem is to be able to test for a previously installed version of the app and then uninstall it from within the deployment procedure.
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Thanks Paul. The other problem is to be able to test for a previously installed version of the app and then uninstall it from within the deployment procedure.
OK, you have various options: First of all, in reference to a previous post, VB.NET Installer classes do not run until the very end of the installation, so they are not useful for uninstalling a previous app in most cases. Plus you are developing in VS6. No insult intended to the previous psoter, but I would eliminate that "option" as unviable. Starting with viable options: The only really easy one is to tell the user they need to uninstall the previous application before they install the new one. Not a very polished approach, but it is the only one that does not require CONSIDERABLE effort on your part. Installshield is a powerful installation application, but it has a steep learning curve. You would still have to manually write the script code to uninstall the previous version. Plus it is very expensive. Wise is also very expensive. If you are going to invest in professional grade installation tools, go with InstallShield. It is a little more than Wise, but if you are going to shell out the bucks for either, go with the top of the line. You have several other options: 1) If you are a decent programmer in C++ you can write your own bootstrapper. The "Setup.exe" included when you build a setup in VB6 with the P&D Wizard is a bootstrapper. Basically a bootstrapper is a pre-setup program that is written in C++ taking care to only use core system functionality - Windows APIs that you know will always be available on any systenm running Windows. In the case of VB, the bootstrapper installs the VB Runtime - that is essentially because the setup you actually see when you run a VB6 setup is also itself written in VB - it's called "Setup1.exe". If the VB runtime is not already installed, a VB setup will not run. So the bootstrapper installs the VB runtime then launches Setup1.exe which then actually runs the install. If you write your own bootstrapper, you can replaced the standard Setup.exe with your own, written so that it looks for the installed app, uninstalls it, bootstraps the Setup1.exe, then the rest of your install is the normal VB setup. There is really only one difficult part of writing your own bootstrapper - it has to be able to extract the VBRuntime files from the CAB. You may be able to find someone who has already written code that will extract files from a setup cab, but personally, I've looked tried to do this myself and ran out of patience with it. The documentation on working with windows setup cabs is pretty damn obtuse. The option just described requires a pre